This is an artificial collection consisting of maps found in the Missouri Valley Special Collections. The collection includes historical, road, and geological maps, as well as travel guides. Most of the...

The materials within the KCPL Reference Hard to Find (HTF) Collection were compiled by Kansas City Public Library reference librarians and staff members to provide an easy to access source of information...

The Missouri Valley Historical Society (1913-1940) was the successor to the Kansas City Historical Society (1906-1913) and the Early Settler's Society and Historical Association (1896-1906). All these...

The Old Men's Association was a social organization that met for 25 years in Kansas City beginning in 1893 up to 1918. Men had to be 60 years old or older in order to qualify for membership. Prominent...

The whole issue of "Overland Journal" is dedicated to the 25th anniversary of its publication. It includes reprinted earlier articles found in the journal and elsewhere. Most of the articles deal with...

St. Joseph, Missouri "had advantages over Independence as it was closer to the Platte and could be reached by steamboat in two days instead of the two weeks or more needed to go overland by ox team. It...

Inscription on back of photo reads, ""Site of Sweetwater Crossing, taken Aug. 20, 1923 by Albert Park, County Surveyor of Casper, Wyo., Independence Rock in distance. Granite mountains in background. Devil's...

Article is subtitled: "The 1941 First Convention/Caravan, Marysville, Kansas, to Denver". Article traces the early history of two organizations dealing with the Oregon Trail as well as other western trails....

Descriptions of caravans on the Santa Fe Trail and Oregon Trail camping in or traveling through the Kansas City area (including "'Camp Oregon' on the Big Blue" River), often trading with local Indians,...

Article about the centennial celebration "of the departure of the first wagon train from St. Louis, Missouri," on the Oregon Trail in 1930 in Wyoming, sponsored by the Oregon Trail Memorial Association...

A journal kept by John Boardman of his journey from the Shawnee Indian Mission in Kansas to Oregon and on to California from May 29 to November 12, 1843. Daily brief entries of one or two sentences describe...

File containing a photo and biographical article about Asa Smith (1856-1857), an infant dying on a wagon train to Oregon and buried by present-day Kansas Highway 7 between Olathe and Bonner Springs, Kansas....

Chapter of the book about J. B. Moncravie, or Jean Baptiste Moncrevie (~1797-1885), a western trader born in France and traveling in the West and on the Oregon Trail with other fur traders such as William...

Photo and chapter of the book about Mariano Medina (~1810-1878), a "Mexican Mountain Man" born in Taos (then in Mexico) and moving to Oregon Territory in the 1840s and around Denver in the 1850s as a fur...

Chapter of the book about James Craigie (1813-1895), "a Presbyterian humanitarian as well as a fur trader," moving from Scotland to the United States in 1835, "assigned almost immediately to Fort Boise,"...

Chapter of the book about Thomas McKay of Oregon (~1796-1850), a mountain man born in "Indian country" and moving with his father (Alexander McKay, another early fur trapper with Alexander Mackenzie) to...